Process for obtaining rubber pellets from used tyres

ABSTRACT

A process for obtaining rubber pellets from used tyres is described, the process comprises a series of steps which take account of the structure of a tyre, and among which are mainly: collecting used tyres having a tread and lateral faces, in which the tread includes an inner layer and an outer layer; and each lateral face includes a flange at the inner edge thereof; separating the tread from the lateral faces; cutting the tread transversely through the inner layer and the outer layer in order to form a strip from the tread; cutting the strip in order to form pellets therefrom; detaching the flange from the separated lateral faces; and cutting the flange-less lateral faces in order to form pellets therefrom.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

The present application is a divisional of application Ser. No.11/914,375, filed Jul. 2, 2008, which is a 371 national phase ofinternational application PCT/IB06/00861, filed Apr. 12, 2006, whichclaims priority of Mexican patent no. PA/A/2005/005042, filed May 11,2005. The entire contents of the prior applications are incorporatedherein by reference.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to the separation and cutting techniquesfor the different parts constituting a tyre, and more particularly, theinvention is related to a process for obtaining rubber pellets from usedtires.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Currently, due to the constant growth of vehicles, the number of usedtyres has been increasing through years. It is estimated that in Mexico25 millions of tyres are disposed yearly and that in the U.S. about onetyre per habitant, therefore constituting one of the acutest pollutionproblems of the last few years, moreover taking into account thatstoring, destroying or finding a practical use to the large volumes ofused tyres represents a great complexity. One main reason for thisproblem is due to the physicochemical properties the tyres acquire whensubjected to vulcanization, making their elimination, recycling ortransformation very complicated.

In Mexico, most of the used tyres normally may be found in streets,breeding grounds, open sky garbage dumps and in few cases in landfills.Then, these deposits faster become a health problem, since vermin suchas mice and mosquitoes are developed therein.

Recently, the Cement industry has been making use of used tyres as fuelfor their furnaces, since tyres are mainly formed by hydrocarbons thuscontaining a very similar heat capacity to that of fossil fuels employedin this industry, or even higher than that of carbon. Tyres areincinerated at temperatures about 1450 C, which according to saidindustry, reaches a complete combustion without residues as soot andother pollutants. However, nowadays only a limited amount of tyres forsuch purposes is allowed to be employed.

Another application for used tyres has been as fillers in highways andbridges slopes, but this use is reduced due to the physical and chemicalproperties of tyres.

Regarding tyre recycling, there are technologies to recover the maintyre materials form which they are manufactured, in other words, rubber,polymeric and steel fibers and cords. These recovered materials areemployed mainly to make new tyres, making carpets, waterproofs, caststeel, rubber and cork agglomerates, shoe soles, etc, in addition, oldtyres may be again vulcanized with new rubber. In tyre recycling, sameare split, cut or grinded to obtain particles, strips, sheets or pelletswhich may be incorporated in the above mentioned products and processes.

However, recycling is a complicated process due to the particular tyrestructure in which the polymeric and steel cords are inside and betweenthe rubber layers, which makes not easy nor direct the obtainment ofparticles having a homogeneous structure.

In order to clearly explain the above, it is convenient to point outthat a tyre has a structure that is defined by two main parts: the treadwhich contacts the pavement and the lateral faces allowing a tyre to bemounted on a rim.

Related to the above, the tread is in turn constituted by an inner layerand an outer layer or tread bottom, the last part making contact withthe pavement. The inner layer is formed mainly by a carcass or framehaving inside a sealing rubber layer; rubber coated polymeric fibercords and depending on the type of tyre, balancing belts. On the otherhand, the outer layer or tread bottom is essentially comprised byrubber, this outer layer is provided with bars, groves, flutings andshoulders, which form the drawing of the tyre.

Describing in more detail the inner layer, the carcass or frame isconformed in its most inner part by the sealing rubber layer, which actsas an air restrainer because it is airtight. Over the sealing rubberlayer are located the cords of polymeric materials, such as rayon,polyester, nylon or steel being covered by rubber in order to avoid anyfriction therebetween. Finally, in the casing most outer part and overthe polymeric or metallic cord layers are optionally located thebalancing belts, which main purpose is to provide balance and uniformityto the tread when the tyre is rotating at high speeds, thus contributingto the tyre strength, less wearing, traction and driving. Commonly, thebalancing belts are made from steel, which provides strengthening andbalancing to the tread without adding much weight to the tyre.

Referring now to the second main part forming the tread, in other words,the outer layer or tread bottom, it may be noted that the groovesprovided in said outer layer are designed to let water and residues torun off, cooling the tyre, traction generation, and to prevent a vehiclelateral slipping. In addition, the grooves are so designed to removenoise emission caused by the air conducting. On the other hand, theflutings included on the tread bottom work to increase the refrigerationor cooling of the tyre, in addition, flutings contribute to the tractioncapacity of the tyre. Meanwhile, the shoulders join the tread to thelateral faces; the shoulders are designed taking account of the bendingof the lateral faces, resulting in a perfect contact of the tread on thepavement. Furthermore, the shoulders aid the weight transfers over thetyre, when a vehicle passes through curves.

On the other hand, as mentioned above, the second basic structure of atyre are formed by lateral faces, each one of them having a flangeforming an inner ring thereof. The lateral faces of the tyre areattached to the tread by the shoulders and are composed by rubbercompounds with high flexural fatigue strength; in addition, the lateralfaces may have inside thereof steel cords in order to provide higherstrength.

In turn, the flange is formed by ring-shaped steel wires. The wires arecopper-coated to avoid oxidation and, in addition, the cords areindividually isolated by rubber compounds to prevent frictiontherebetween. The flange acts to anchor the tyre to the rim, the flangeshould have a high breaking strength, such that the flange is filledwith a hard rubber compound to overcome the severity of the tyremounting. Upon manufacturing of a tyre, the flanges are attached to thelateral faces while assembling the tyre, and further, they becometotally bonded by the vulcanization process.

Once having explained the basic structure of a tyre, it is important tomention that machines allowing to separate the two main parts comprisinga tyre are disclosed in the prior art, such as the machine of theMexican patent 188,444 which belongs to the same inventor of the processbeing described in the instant document. Said patent is related to atyre cutting machine, which makes possible to efficiently separate thelateral faces from the tread thus decreasing the volume occupied by theused tyres. However, this patent does not mention how the separatedparts may be processed in order to obtain homogeneous particles orpellets capable of being recycled with the aforementioned processes andproducts.

Likewise, belonging to the prior art is the Mexican patent 160,377,disclosing a machine conceived to cut used tyres, said machineincorporates an structure having a cylindrical anvil roller, rotatablymounted thereon. Further, the machine employs, in the structure, a pairof knife rollers that rotate in parallel axes to the anvil rollerrotation axis, said knife rollers being angularly spaced apart to eachother and to the anvil roller axis, such that the tyres pass through theanvil roller between the knife rollers, thus obtaining rhombus shapedtyre cuts almost having a quadrangular shape. However, like otherexisting machines, the '377 machine does not take account the structureof the tyre, since tyres are feed to the machine as a whole, resultingin a high power consumption, besides to the fact that the rubber rhombusthus obtained are not uniform, in such a manner that cords and fibersprotrude from the rhombus which may harm the personnel working withthem.

Another case is that of the Mexican Patent No. 160,376 which describes asimilar machine to that in the 160,377 patent, this machine comprises ananvil roller and a knife roller rotating about the axis parallel to theanvil roller rotating axis. Likewise, this machine cut the tyre inpieces without making a difference nor obtaining the maximum benefitsfrom the different parts constituting the tyres.

Another important prior art document, is the Mexican Patent ApplicationNo. 9401943, which describes a machine consisting of a pair of platformsto place the tyre wherein the tyre rubber is cut through high pressurefluid cutting operations, however, the inconvenience with this type ofmachines is that operating a highly pressured fluid is highly expensive,besides to the inconvenience of accomplishing cleaning and recycling ofthe fluid used in the machine operation.

As may be noted, the prior techniques are limited to cut in a randommanner the used tyre, or by means of highly expensive machines, and donot provide a logical sequence to obtain the greatest benefits from thetyre constituents, further, said techniques do not distinguish theparticular manner in which the rubber, and polymeric and metal stringsare related to each other in a tyre.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

As a consequence form the above, the drawbacks and inconveniences of theprior art techniques and processes to recycle used tyres have been triedto be suppressed by providing a process for obtaining rubber pelletsfrom used tyres, wherein said process may be carried out mainly throughsimple and organized operations allowing to obtain homogeneous rubberpellets capable or being rapidly manageable in a great variety ofrecycling applications.

Particularly, the process for obtaining rubber pellets from used tyresof the present invention comprises the following steps:

a) collecting used tyres having a tread and lateral faces, in which thetread includes an inner layer and an outer layer; each lateral faceincluding a flange at the inner edge thereof;

b) separating the tread from the lateral faces;

c) cutting the tread transversely through the inner layer and the outerlayer in order to form a strip of the tread;

d) cutting the tread obtained in the previous step in order to formpellets therefrom;

e) detaching the flange from the lateral faces which were separated instep (b); and

f) cutting the flange-less lateral faces obtained in the previous stepin order to form pellets therefrom;

With the above steps arrangement and sequence, rubber pellets from thetread and lateral faces are obtained. An advantage of this process isthat the pellets thus obtained from the two main parts of the tyre havea regular shape and size, in addition, said rubber pellets includepolymeric and metallic fiber or cords not protruding therefrom, so thesubsequent management of the pellets does not represent any risk for thepersonnel working with them.

In a first preferred embodiment of the process of the present invention,the step (d) or “first pellet cutting step”, is carried out in twosteps, in the first of which longitudinal and parallel cuts arepracticed over the strip of the tread, thus forming a first plurality ofthinner strips, and in the second step, transversal and parallel cutsare accomplished over said thinner strips in order to form the rubberpellets. Processing in such sequential and organized manner the tread,represents the advantage of having a suitable size control for theformed rubber pellets and above all, the protrusion of the cords andfibers present in the tread from the formed rubber pellets is avoided.

In a second preferred embodiment, the process of the present inventioncomprises a further stage after separating the tread form the lateralfaces in the separation stage (b), the further stage consisting onseparating the tread outer layer form the inner layer, these layersbeing subsequently transversely cut in order to form an outer layerstrip and an inner layer strip, which are then independently cut in thefirst pellet cutting step (d) thus forming rubber pellets from each oneof said strips. This embodiment has the advantage of obtaining pelletsessentially conformed by rubber from the tread outer layer.

In a third preferred embodiment, the process comprises a sieving step ofthe pellets obtained from the tread and lateral faces in the firstpellet cutting step (b) as wells in the second pellet cutting step (f).The sieving has the object of separating and sorting the pelletsaccording to their size, since some pellets may differ in shape andsize, especially those formed from the lateral faces in the secondpellet cutting step (f) due to the circular edged nature of the lateralfaces.

As may be noted, it is an object of the present invention to provide aprocess for obtaining rubber pellets from used tyres, wherein the mainparts of the tyre are being cut and separated in a systematic manner,facilitating the tyre recycling.

Another object of the invention is to provide a process for obtainingrubber pellets from used tyres, wherein pellets essentially made ofrubber and rubber pellets containing in their inside fibers or stringsmay be obtained.

It is yet an object of the present invention to provide a process forobtaining pellets from used tyres, wherein the steps sequence representsa use in practice and a lower power consumption than feeding the wholetyre to the prior art machines.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The novel aspects considered characteristic of the present invention,are set forth particularly in the appended claims. However, theoperation, together with another objects and advantages thereof, will bebetter understood with the following detailed description of certainspecific embodiments, when read related to the appended drawings,wherein:

FIG. 1, is a perspective view of a transversely cut tyre portion.

FIG. 2, is a flow chart of the process for obtaining rubber pellets fromused tyres of the present invention.

FIG. 3, is a flow chart of the process for obtaining rubber pellets fromused tyres, according to a first specific embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 4, is a flow chart of the process for obtaining rubber pellets fromused tyres, according to a second specific embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 5, is a flow chart of the process for obtaining rubber pellets fromused tyres, according to a third specific embodiment of the presentinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

In order to properly explain the advantages and organization of theprocess of the present invention, it is convenient to describe thegeneral structure of a tyre, and therefore reference is made to FIG. 1,wherein a tyre 10 is shown which is constituted by a tread 20 contactingthe pavement; and, lateral faces 30 for mounting the tyre 10 on a rim.In same FIG. 1, it may be seen that the tread 20 in turn comprises aninner layer 21 and an outer layer 22. In the inside of the first ofthese layers also known as carcass or frame, there is a sealing rubberlayer 23 and over this rubber there are several layers 24 ofrubber-coated polymeric fibers or metallic cords, in addition, in thetyre 10 shown in FIG. 1 balancing belts 25 are also seen.

Regarding the external layer 22, the same has a tread bottom 26 andshoulders 27 in order to connect the tread 20 with the lateral faces 30.In this aspect, it is noted that the inner edge of the lateral faces 30is formed by a flange 31 allowing the tyre 10 to support the tyre 10mounting and demounting operations on a rim.

Once having described the general conformation of a tyre, reference ismade to FIG. 2, wherein a flow chart of the essential steps comprised bythe process 100 of the present invention is shown, the process startswith a collecting step 110, wherein the used tyres 10 are collected,likewise, in this collecting step 110, used tyres 10 are preferablysorted according to their size, type and physical condition.

Further, in process 100, the separation step 120 is carried out, whereinthe tread 20 is separated from the lateral faces 30 from each used tyre10 collected. Once the main two parts of the tyre 10 have been separatedin the separation step 120, the tread 20 is sent to the transversal cutstep 130, wherein said tread 20 is transversely cut through its outerand inners layers in order to form a strip 28 from the tread. Then, thefirst pellet cutting step 140 takes place, wherein the tread strip 28 iscut in such a manner that rubber pellets 11 are formed therefrom.

Now then, process 100 also contemplates forming pellets from the lateralfaces 30 being separated in the separation step 120, to achieve thissaid lateral faces 30 are processed in the detaching step 150, in whichthe flange 31 of each lateral face 30 is detached and disposed.Following the detaching step 150, the flange-less lateral faces 30 arereceived in a second pellet cutting step 160, wherein said lateral faces30 are cut in such a manner that other rubber pellets 11 are formed.

Related to the above, the main reason because flange 31 is detached fromeach lateral face in the detaching step 150, is because the flange has avery complex structure that is very different to that of the remainderof the lateral face 30. In the flanges, there are copper and rubbercoated steel wires, which would complicate carrying out the secondpellet cutting step 160 thus forming rubber pellets 11 with two verydifferent structures.

Otherwise, the rubber pellets 11 obtained from the tread strip 28 andflange-less lateral faces 30 share a very alike structure therebetween,in other words, they include inside fibers and cords, as mentioned abovethe lateral faces 30 have steel cords like the tread, and then thepellets 11 may be mixed to be taken to the respective facilities to berecycled. In the process of the present invention, the rubber pellets 11obtained from the first and second pellet cutting steps 140 and 160,respectively, have a preferred size of about 6.4 mm to about 50.8 mm.Further, they have a rhomboidal or quadrangular shape.

As may be understood from the disclosure related to FIG. 2, theseparation step 120, the transversal cutting step 130, the first pelletcutting step 140, the detaching step 150 and the second pellet cuttingstep 160 include separation and cutting operations, such that said stepsare carried out by means of cutting hand tools or cutting machinesmechanically, hydraulically or electrically driven. For instance,cutting hand tools that may be used are shears, power shears, knives andblades. Meanwhile the cutting machines may be shearing machines or bladepresses machines and cutting multi-discs machines. Specifically, theseparation step 120 may be carried out using the machine described inthe Mexican patent 188,444.

An important aspect to be mentioned is that, in the second pelletcutting step 160, longitudinal and transversal cuttings are performedsimultaneously in a grid-like manner over the lateral faces 30 thusforming the rubber pellets 11. Of course, some of the rubber pellets 11will have a circularly or rounded shaped due to the circular edge of thelateral faces 30, however, this case will be described a few paragraphsbelow.

The present invention may be carried out according to specificembodiments, first of which is shown in FIG. 3, the process beingreferred to as 101, comprises all same steps as described in FIG. 1, inother words, comprises the step of collecting 110 used tyres 10; theseparation step 120, wherein the lateral faces 30 are detached from thetread 20; the transversal cutting step 130 of the tread 20; thedetaching step 150 of the flange 31; and the first and second pelletcutting steps 140 and 160, wherein the strip 28 from the tread andlateral faces 30 is cut in the form of rubber pellets 11. However, inthis first preferred embodiment, the first pellet cutting step 140 iscarried out in two stages, the first stage 141, wherein longitudinal andparallel cuts are accomplished to each other over the tread strip 28entering said first pellet cutting step 140, such that a first pluralityof thinner strips 29 are formed, and the second stage 142, whereintransversal and parallel cuts are accomplished to each other over saidthin strips 29 in order to form the rubber pellets 11. Processing insuch sequential and organized manner the tread strip 28, represents theadvantage of having an accurate control over the size of the thus formedrubber pellets 11, and the protrusion of the strings and fibers beingpresent in the tread out of the formed rubber pellets 11 is avoided.

Preferably, the first and second stages 141 and 142 are accomplished bycutting machines having a plurality of parallel cutting knives, bladesor discs spaced apart one to each other.

In an alternative embodiment of the process, in the first pellet cuttingstep 140, transversal and parallel cuts to each other over the treadstrip are initially accomplished in order to form a second plurality ofstrips having the same width to that of the tread, and thereafter,parallel cuts are accomplished to form the rubber pellets from thissecond plurality of strips. This embodiment also allows to have controlover the formed pellets, however, considering aspects related to thehandling of the tread strip 28, it is preferably to initially carry outthe parallel cuts along said strip 28 as outlined in FIG. 3.

Referring now to FIG. 4, a second specific preferred embodiment of theprocess of the present invention is shown, the second embodiment,referred to as 102, as may be noted comprises the collecting step 110 ofused tyres; the separation step 120, wherein the lateral faces 30 aredetached from the tread 20; the transversal cutting step 130 of thetread 20; the detaching step 150 of the flange 31; and the second pelletcutting step 160, wherein the flange-less lateral faces 30 are cut inthe form of rubber pellets 11. However, in the process 102 of thissecond embodiment, after the separation step 120, the tread 20 issubjected to a splitting step 170, wherein the inner layer 21 of thetread 20 is separated from the outer layer 22. Thereafter, said treads21 and 22 are independently transversely cut in the transversal cuttingstep 130, in order to obtain a strip from the inner layer 131 and astrip from the outer layer 132, then these strips 131 and 132 areindependently cut in the first pellet cutting step 140 thus obtainingrubber pellets 11 and 11′, in which the rubber pellets 11 incorporateinside cords and fibers, while the rubber pellets 11′ essentiallyconsist of rubber.

Finally, reference is made to FIG. 5, wherein a third specificembodiment of the process of the present invention is shown, this thirdembodiment referred to as 103, once more includes the collecting 110step of used tyres 10; the separation step 120, wherein the lateralfaces 30 are detached from the tread 20; the transversal cutting step130 of the tread 20; the detaching step 150 of the flange 31; and thefirst and second pellet cutting steps 140 and 160, wherein the strip 28from the tread and the lateral faces 30 are cut in the form of rubberpellets 11. However, taking account that the lateral faces arecircularly-shaped and that in many used tyres 10 the tread 20 has anuneven surface wearing, the process 103 of this third embodimentcomprises carrying out a sieving step 180, wherein the rubber pellets 11form the first and second pellet cutting steps 140 and 160 are passedthrough meshes, screens or sieves in order to separate those pellets nothaving the preferred size of from about 6.4 mm to about 50.8 mm.

Although in the above description have been described and shown specificembodiments of the invention, it must be pointed out that there areseveral possible modifications, for instance, the cutting direction inthe tread for obtaining the pellets may be varied, thus varying the formof the obtained pellets. Therefore, the present invention must not belimited for the set forth in the state of the art and by the appendedclaims.

1. Rubber pellets obtained from used tires by a process comprising thesteps of: a) collecting used tires having a tread and lateral faces, inwhich the tread includes an inner layer and an outer layer; and eachlateral face includes a flange at the inner edge thereof; b) separatingthe tread from the lateral faces; c) cutting the tread transverselythrough the inner layer and the outer layer in order to form a stripfrom the tread; d) cutting the strip obtained in the previous step inorder to form pellets therefrom in two stages: i) in the first of whichlongitudinal and parallel cuts are accomplished over the tread strip,thus forming a first plurality of thinner strips; ii) and in the secondstage, transversal and parallel cuts are accomplished over the thinnerstrips in order to form the rubber pellets; e) detaching the flange fromthe lateral faces which were separated in step (b); and; f) cutting theflange-less lateral faces form the previous step in order to formpellets therefrom; g) separating the tread outer layer from the innerlayer, thereafter these layers are transversally cut in the transversalcutting step (d) in order to form an outer layer strip and an innerlayer strip, which are then independently cut in the first pelletcutting step (d) to form the rubber pellets from each one of saidstrips; wherein the rubber pellets are obtained from the tread and thelateral faces, having a lateral size between 6.4 mm and 50.8 mm andregular shape.
 2. The rubber pellets according to claim 1, wherein thepellets have a quadrangular or rhomboidal shape.
 3. The rubber pelletsaccording to claim 1, wherein the pellets including in their insidepolymeric and metallic fibers and cords not protruding therefrom. 4.Rubber pellets from used tires, wherein the rubber pellets are obtainedfrom the tread and the lateral faces, the pellets having a lateral sizebetween 6.4 mm and 50.8 mm and regular shape.
 5. The rubber pelletsaccording to claim 4, wherein the pellets have a quadrangular orrhomboidal shape.
 6. The rubber pellets according to claim 5, whereinthe pellets including in their inside polymeric and metallic fibers andcords not protruding therefrom.